Shockers in EQ

I was thinking this afternoon about things that shocked me in EQ. I've already mentioned the torture scenes in Prisoners of Conscience. I have also been shocked sometimes how McCall reacts to killing people. For all the talk of his leaving his old life behind, he certain still has part of it in him. (I probably ordered my posts wrong in this blog -- I should have posted my thoughts on Prisoners of Conscience last, because perhaps it is the answer to these earlier issues?)

I don't have the episode list in front of me so for the moment I won't have the names of episodes but here goes. Perhaps the most disturbing for me is the episode where he is helping the woman who was raped by three men in the subway station. At the end of the episode, McCall figures out that the woman's friend is probably in danger and rushes to the station to help her. Indeed the three men are at the station and they are harassing the woman. As he is running down the stairs, McCall meets the woman running up and tells her to keep running and don't turn back. Next we see the three men draw various weapons, then the camera returns to the woman. We hear three shots. The writers set up the story line so that McCall was forced to shoot them. Was that necessary? One could easily think of other scenarios where he did not have to gun them down. Did they feel they had to pander to the part of the audience that tuned into the show to see (or hear) shocking violence? Later he is affected by his actions, telling his woman friend that his profession is "killing people." I suppose it fits into his trying to figure out who he is, but still...

At least in that episode he feels remorse. There are others when he is completed cold blooded about killing. Think of the terrorist Zahndt in the A Community of Civilized men (the title of course pointing to the irony). McCall and Zahndt, who insists that he and McCall are alike, play a little game, McCall pretending he is complying with Zahndt and Zahndt doing the same. McCall wins. As he is defusing the bomb, the young woman says, but he (Zahndt) is getting away. McCall says, no he's not, after which Zahndt is blown to smitherines by a bomb McCall has planted. McCall shows absolutely no emotion. Later he cannot explain himself to the young woman, unsure if he is like Zahndt or not. He is only weary.

Then there are the mafia sorts that McCall kills in a car bomb at the end of the episode about Yvette. He has set them up, and cleverly puts the bomb meant for Yvette and Philippe into their car. Again without emotion, McCall watches them drive away in the car, knowing that the bomb will kill them, which it does a few seconds later. He simply turns and walks away.

Are these people so terrible that he does not have to feel anything when they are killed? Or is this an example of his deadened sense of right and wrong? Clearly the writers have made them terrible people and we do not feel he should not have killed them, in the context of a fantasy TV show. But it just doesn't seem to fit into his new life. I suppose the answer is that he hasn't left the old life yet.